TLMT312 WEEK 2 FORUM Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

TLMT312 WEEK 2 FORUM - Assignment Example TCO is much wider in manufacturing; the cost involve include cycle time, repair, ship, re-ship, opportunity, incentives, tax credit, delivery and supplier visits costs (Richard, 2004). TCO ensures financial analysis by determining the total economic value of products and investments. The financial analysis entails; economic value added, rapid economic justification, and internal return rate. TCO analyzes the total cost of assets and related systems, in the entire organization processes. This ensures adequate forecasting of profitability of the organization (Richard, 2004). TCO is applied in the computer industry, fro financial analysis by multinationals. TCO describes the financial effect of using the information technology products, throughout the entire lifecycle. The cost analysis considers the main aspects of computer hardware, training and software. Technology implementation entails three levels of costs. Hardware and software analysis costs like; warranties, licenses, purchasing research and risks. Operation costs entail infrastructure, electricity, insurance, testing and back up. Long term costs include replacement, upgrade and decommissioning (Richard, 2004). When comparing the TCO between present and proposed technology solutions, maintenance expenses should be analyzed. The maintenance expenses for present solutions may not be applicable for the proposed technological solution (Richard,

Kairos moment Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Kairos moment - Essay Example My kairos moment Growing up I was passionate about being a medical doctor. I believed that I would serve the community better if I was able to attend patients. This caused me to win support from my parents who urged me to be the best performer in related studies. My childhood experience let me to appreciate the need to have a stable family. My parents separated when I was still a teenager. This affected my academic performance and shook my goals to the core. I realized that part of the reason for the separation was because of the long working hours my father was having in his career. My father was an accomplished medical doctor whose achievements caused him to be extremely busy. One evening, when I was in school I took time to think over and understand the pain I was going through arising from the separation. I was feeling helpless, vulnerable and deserted. I took time to relook at my career aspirations and consider the implications they would have in future. This period coincided th e school schedule set to determine the future career as a pupil. That became my defining moment in career. I opted to change my career with an expectation to spend adequate time with my family. This explains why am in this class. It later turned out that my actual flair was in linguistics and oratory skills. I almost succumb to my father’s pressure to join his profession. My reaction was urgent and opportune although it was triggered by metal anguish. I was in an ideal place to determine my career and did it in the right time. Ancient thinkers considered the kairos moments to be important. Success is dependent on the ability to balance particular within a given situation (Crowley and Hawhee, 37). Greeks had two words that were used to describe time. These were kairos and chronos. The impression created is that when these moments are missed, incredible opportunities are lost. The awareness and timing of an opportunity or situation affects the achievements to be expected. Kairo s is about balancing the various aspects of a situation (Hambrick, 7). People are expected to be watchful for the opportune moment to achieve a desired result. This moment is seized with a sense of urgency, self-awareness and with precisions. According to ancient Greek thinkers, there was an ideal time for doing something no matter how difficult. The willingness to take a chance can be the difference between successful people and failures (Crowley and Hawhee, 38). The currency and urgency of a situation is linked to the ability of the beneficiary to have prior information of the moment. This urgency demands action. Kairos moments teach us that it is possible for people to lose the immediacy of a moment. This causes the relevance of the issue to appear misplaced. Kairos moments justify the fact that we live in a dynamic world where the appropriateness of a moment is dependent on the current audience, prevailing views, time and place of the rhetoric (Crowley and Hawhee, 42). Kairos po ints indicate the situatedness of an argument at a particular place in time. Why this was a karotic moment The timeliness of the decision action helped to me to appreciate the need to change my career aspirations. The decision happened in an opportune moment, the ideal time to pick a career of right time. I had the courage and the strength to take the bold step that became a blessing which

Sport Training Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3000 words

Sport Training - Essay Example However, when lactate production is excessive, it accumulates in the muscles and the blood. Meanwhile, if the glycogen stores of the muscles and blood decrease, the exercises slow down and when the aerobic procedures undertaken are not sufficient, the exercise can not be maintained (Astrand & Rodahl, 1987; Fox, Bowers, & Fos, 1988; Weineck, 1986). Lactat is accumulated in the organism after all kinds of muscle exercise having maximal and supramaximal workload. It can even be observed within ten minutes workload (Jacops et al, 1983). The measurements of lactate in the muscle and blood are being done to determine these processes. Lactate measurements during exercise yield information on the intensity of the workload and on its duration. The measurements carried out after the exercise yield information on the frequency of workload and on its scope, that is, on resting-recovery process (Bueno, 1990). Babij found that, after an exercise of 10 minutes where maximal oxygen consumption rate was 50%, there was no accumulation of venous blood, and that, after the same exercise where oxygen consumption rate was 76%, lactate of the venous blood increased up to 5 minutes and then started to decline (Babij et al, 1983). The number of infantile and juvenile competitions has significantly increased over the past two decades (Bar-Or O. 1996; Colantonio et al, 1997; Kemper, 1995; Matveev, 1996), which has favored world records to be broken by 14-year old athletes. One knows well metabolic and functional responses to exercises in adults, whether normal or with impairments (Del et al, 1985; Negrao et al, 1998) but there are many issues that are yet to be solved regarding physical training of children and adolescents (Bar-Or O, 1996). Aerobic fitness is instrumental for children and adolescents, not only for healthfulness8, but also for the practice of a number of sports (McArdle et al, 1996). Human capability of performing mid and long-duration exercises chiefly depends on aerobic metabolism. Thus, one of the main indices used to assess this condition is the maximum oxygen uptake (VO2max), known as aerobic power (Denadai BS, 1995; Kiss MAPDM, 2000). According to literature, in maximum exertion tests, swimmers (S) and water polo players (WP) typically present VO2max values close to 69.012 and 55.513 (ml.kg-1.min-1), respectively. In judo practitioners, it has been observed, from four consecutive Wingate test bouts for upper limbs that oxygen uptake (VO2) in the first bout was lower than that in the second, but there were no differences from the later in the third and fourth bouts, showing a tendency to stabilization. For swimming and water polo, when comparing two consecutive Wingate test bouts for upper (ARMS) and lower limbs (LEGS), and specific tests at the pool, there was good correlation only for ARMS (r = 0.85, p In spite of evidences about mean VO2max values at exercises in which aerobic metabolism prevail, it is interesting to observe its behavior in exercises in which anaerobic metabolism prevail. VO2max may be defined as the highest oxygen (O2) uptake accomplished by an individual breathing air at sea level (Astrand PO, 1952). This variable is one of the main items examined in endurance studies, in spite of the use of the expression oxygen peak uptake (VO2peak) to describe O2 uptake values from any

Kairos moment Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Kairos moment - Essay Example My kairos moment Growing up I was passionate about being a medical doctor. I believed that I would serve the community better if I was able to attend patients. This caused me to win support from my parents who urged me to be the best performer in related studies. My childhood experience let me to appreciate the need to have a stable family. My parents separated when I was still a teenager. This affected my academic performance and shook my goals to the core. I realized that part of the reason for the separation was because of the long working hours my father was having in his career. My father was an accomplished medical doctor whose achievements caused him to be extremely busy. One evening, when I was in school I took time to think over and understand the pain I was going through arising from the separation. I was feeling helpless, vulnerable and deserted. I took time to relook at my career aspirations and consider the implications they would have in future. This period coincided th e school schedule set to determine the future career as a pupil. That became my defining moment in career. I opted to change my career with an expectation to spend adequate time with my family. This explains why am in this class. It later turned out that my actual flair was in linguistics and oratory skills. I almost succumb to my father’s pressure to join his profession. My reaction was urgent and opportune although it was triggered by metal anguish. I was in an ideal place to determine my career and did it in the right time. Ancient thinkers considered the kairos moments to be important. Success is dependent on the ability to balance particular within a given situation (Crowley and Hawhee, 37). Greeks had two words that were used to describe time. These were kairos and chronos. The impression created is that when these moments are missed, incredible opportunities are lost. The awareness and timing of an opportunity or situation affects the achievements to be expected. Kairo s is about balancing the various aspects of a situation (Hambrick, 7). People are expected to be watchful for the opportune moment to achieve a desired result. This moment is seized with a sense of urgency, self-awareness and with precisions. According to ancient Greek thinkers, there was an ideal time for doing something no matter how difficult. The willingness to take a chance can be the difference between successful people and failures (Crowley and Hawhee, 38). The currency and urgency of a situation is linked to the ability of the beneficiary to have prior information of the moment. This urgency demands action. Kairos moments teach us that it is possible for people to lose the immediacy of a moment. This causes the relevance of the issue to appear misplaced. Kairos moments justify the fact that we live in a dynamic world where the appropriateness of a moment is dependent on the current audience, prevailing views, time and place of the rhetoric (Crowley and Hawhee, 42). Kairos po ints indicate the situatedness of an argument at a particular place in time. Why this was a karotic moment The timeliness of the decision action helped to me to appreciate the need to change my career aspirations. The decision happened in an opportune moment, the ideal time to pick a career of right time. I had the courage and the strength to take the bold step that became a blessing which

Environmental Ethical Issues Essay Example for Free

Environmental Ethical Issues Essay The world has over the last few years been witnessing a remarkable rise in awareness in philosophical ideologies that are geared towards the environment. A number of theories such as animal rights, eco-feminism, deep ecology, bio-centric ethics and other theories have been proposed with the main aim of providing value to the environment. Environmental philosophies have helped in exploring various causes of environmental destruction and the proposals they put across that would help to reverse the trend of destruction and restore the environment to an acceptable level. Most of the practices that these theories try to raise are geared towards grappling with the effects produced by the industrial and economic cultures that thrive in most countries. However, a variety of issues arise pertaining to the applicability of environmental ethics and whether the theoretical outcomes are attainable (Brennan and Lo, 2009). Nature has always been an important aspect of human life, this is evident with the recent surge of focus in the subject as more and more people become aware of the environment. The issue of environmental ethics came into being as a discipline in schools in the 1970’s. Philosophies during the 1960’s had the perception that the late 20th century would witness a ‘population time bomb†. Rachael Carol was one of the vocal scientists who drew much attention to the issue of an environmental crisis by detailing the impact that pesticides would have on the environment. Lynn White jr. also did a masterpiece essay that traced the roots of environmental crisis by arguing that Judeo-Christian thinking was a major contributor in the over-exploitation of nature. He argues that the thinking was that human beings were superior to nature, which is a theory that is widely discussed in theology and history. This as he argues tends to cause a kind of arrogance towards nature and this tends to be a cause environmental crisis (Brennan and Lo, 2009). Polluting or destroying the environment is behaviors that are considered as immoral and this perception proves that human beings are embracing the concept that a sustainable environment is necessary for survival. However, the process of keeping a sustainable environment may mean culling animals, destroying overpopulated species, putting out natural fires and this often leads to some issues such as the morality of the actions taken. Another issue that arises is the restoration of an environment after destruction such as when a mining company restores a land after working on it for a while which begs the question of whether there is a â€Å"difference between restoring an environment or a natural one† (Brennan and Lo, 2009). Modern day scientists have often argued that finding a distinction between â€Å"instrumental values and intrinsic values† is of great importance (Brennan and Lo, 2009). Instrumental values mean that are usable while on the other hand, intrinsic values are not reusable are an end to their survival. Fruits are considered to be of instrumental value to bats that feed on them since this makes the bats survive. The fruits on the other hand are not widely regarded as having an intrinsic value for themselves. This debate has been one of the contentious environmental ethics issues. Things considered being of intrinsic value demand protection morally with regard to those that are instrumental. Most traditional thinkers often tagged the term intrinsic value only to humans with a renowned philosopher Aristotle arguing that â€Å"nature has made all things specifically for the sake of man† which means that everything else is classified as instrumental (Keller 2010). However, with the advent of the environmental ethics, the issue of man’s moral superiority to other species in the planet is been challenged. The other borne of contention that is trying to be tackled, is the classification of intrinsic and instrumental values among various species. Modern scientists have often argued that the main essence of environmental ethics is directed towards providing moral grounds for policies that are aimed at protecting the planets environment and tackling issues of environmental degradation before they get out of hand (Keller, 2010). The fate of the outcomes that environmental ethics aims to fulfill lies in how various laws will be enacted. A considerable number of philosophers have come up with ideologies and they should be used in order to formulate laws so as to promote environmental values that are acceptable and also attainable. Everybody should be part of ensuring that the environment is being conserved so as to ensure survival of for the present and future generations. It cannot escape out attention that we are living in a nuclear age where we heavily depend on energy that produces waste which some of it is hazardous to the environment and even unrecyclable. These types of waste require careful management in getting rid off, so as to ensure that they do not pose significant threats to the environment. Although these types of waste may not have short-term effects at the present, they may be catastrophic for the future generation and thus the need to practice wise environmental ethics at the present to ensure survival and a future for the planet. References: Keller, D. R. (2010). Environmental Ethics: The Big Question. New York: John Wiley and Sons. Brennan, A. and Lo, Y. (2009). Environmental Ethics, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Winter 2009 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed. ), derived on August 16, 2010 http://plato. stanford. edu/archives/win2009/entries/ethics-environmental/ .

Understanding McDonalds history and strategy analysis

Understanding McDonalds history and strategy analysis McDonalds Corporation is the worlds largest chain of fast food restaurants, serving nearly 47 million customers daily through more than 31,000 restaurants in 119 countries worldwide. McDonalds sells various fast food items and soft drinks including, burgers, chicken, salads, fries, and ice cream. Many McDonalds restaurants have included a playground for children and advertising geared toward children, and some have been redesigned in a more natural style, with a particular emphasis on comfort: introducing lounge areas and fireplaces, and eliminating hard plastic chairs and tables. Each McDonalds restaurant is operated by a franchisee, an affiliate, or the corporation itself. The corporations revenues come from the rent, royalties and fees paid by the franchisees, as well as sales in company-operated restaurants. McDonalds revenues grew 27% over the three years ending in 2007 to $22.8 billion, and 9% growth in operating income to $3.9 billion. History analysis: The business began in 1940, with a restaurant opened by brothers Dick and Mac McDonald in San Bernardino, California. Their introduction of the Speedee Service System in 1948 established the principles of the modern fast-food restaurant. The original mascot of McDonalds was a man with a chefs hat on top of a hamburger shaped head whose name was Speedee. Speedee was eventually replaced with Ronald McDonald in 1963. The present corporation dates its founding to the opening of a franchised restaurant by Ray Kroc, in Des Plaines, Illinois on April 15, 1955 , the ninth McDonalds restaurant overall. Kroc later purchased the McDonald brothers equity in the company and led its worldwide expansion and the company became listed on the public stock markets in 1965. With the expansion of McDonalds into many international markets, the company has become a symbol of globalization and the spread of the American way of life. Its prominence has also made it a frequent topic of public debates about obesity, corporate ethics and consumer responsibility. McDonalds Corporation pioneers the training of its franchise owners in 1961 with the opening of Hamburger University. This move was aimed to maintain manager and franchisee loyalty in spite of a highly competitive market. First Mcdonals in 1940 Strategic Planning Strategy is defined as the determination of the basic long-term objectives of an enterprise and the adoption of courses of action and allocation of resources necessary to achieve these goals. The time length for strategies is arbitrary, but is probably two, three, or perhaps as many as five years. It is generally determined by how far in the future the organization is committing its resources. A strategy may include major policies. The purpose of strategies, then, is to determine and communicate, through a system of major objectives and policies, a picture of the kind of enterprise that is envisioned. They furnish a framework for guiding thinking and action. Their usefulness in practice and their importance in guiding planning do, however, justify the separation of strategies as a type of plan for the purpose of analysis. Under how the marketing plan supports strategic objectives Phillip Kotler defines marketing as Satisfying needs and wants of the customers through an exchange process. Strategic objective means core objective of company is achieved by some strategy. McDonalds main objective is globalization. McDonalds CEO and marketing executive periodically faces urgent strategic marketing challenges that can affect the future of the company for many years. Frequently these decisions are made without having an opportunity to study the situation and make the best possible decision. A better approach is to perform an annual comprehensive review of markets and opportunities, then make long-term strategic decisions without the distractions of day-to-day marketing and sales activities. Daily decisions then fit into the companys overall strategic marketing goals. Strategic marketing planning process to look at the McDonalds from the customers point of view by asking questions that have a long time horizon, such as: What needs or problems cause customers to consider buying from our McDonalds? What improvements in the customers personal or business life can we enable or improve? Which customer market segments are attracted to McDonalds? 1.2 identify the component parts of the marketing plan Situation Analysis External Analysis Customer Analysis Internal Analysis SWOT Analysis Situation Analysis The situation analysis helps to determine where our organization presently stands. It should examine whats going on outside of the organization, whats happening with consumers, and how the business is functioning internally. External Analysis What external changes are taking place in target market (city, county, state, country and around the world) that could potentially impact McDonalds business? Some things to investigate are: à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Changes in political positions and legislation national levels à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Changes in technology (new equipment) à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Trends and taste in societys values and habits à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Competitors à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Economic conditions (purchasing power) Customer Analysis Before developing a marketing plan its important to find out what consumers want and how they make purchase decisions. This may require some marketing research. Think about these factors: à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Potential customers à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Consumer buying behavior à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Which item is more sale then other and why? Internal Analysis Knowing the state of the McDonalds and its resources helps to determine where it is strong and what areas need attention. The following also include in the marketing plan à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Current state of human resources à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Businesss performance according to competitors SWOT Analysis Conducting a SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats) analysis is essential in assessing the companys position and serves as a guide to developing marketing plans. Benefits of a SWOT Analysis A SWOT analysis provides a fairly simple, low-cost way of assessing the companys position. It presents information that is important in developing business and marketing plans, as well as setting organizational goals and objectives. It tells you where the company currently sits, and where it needs to go in the future. When McDonalds conduct SWOT analysis à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Examine your companys strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats from a customers perspective. If youre having trouble viewing issues that way, ask customers what they think through feed back form which is present on very McDonalds or conduct surveys to view over all target market. à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Separate internal issues from external issues. The companys strengths and weaknesses are internal; opportunities and threats are external. The main think is, first McDonalds analysis these two other factors are present in us yes or not. If the answer is yes, the issue should be classified as external. Some things to consider about company when determining your strengths and weaknesses are: à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Size à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Scale à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Customer Perceptions (changing taste, what they need new) McDonalds is doing some research on existing competitors, industry, and the environment in order to complete the opportunities and threats portion of your SWOT analysis. Here are some main points to consider: à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Trends in the competitive environment à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Trends in the technological environment (update technology) Once McDonalds finished his SWOT analysis, include the resulting strategy in business and marketing plans. Some key actions to take include à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Transform strengths into capabilities by matching them with opportunities in the environment. Strength: The company has a very efficient order fulfillment and process very fast way Opportunity: There is an unfulfilled need for the companys product in other countries Capability: The Company is capable of providing its taste worldwide à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Convert weaknesses into strengths by investing strategically in key areas. Weakness: Employees are not familiar with the latest technology (lack of on job trainings) Investment: sends employees to classes, workshops, and conferences Strength: Employees now have inside information on cutting edge technology à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢ Weaknesses that cannot be converted into strengths become limitations. Any limitation that is obvious and meaningful to consumers must be minimized. Meaning to consumers: Consumers may not be able to find the new items verity Minimization: Allow consumers to purchase through other channels, such as McDonalds open parcel window if any person want to take away he dont need to stand in queue in side the McDonalds, he drives to that window and make order. 2.2 Mitigation Plan1 A defined set of tasks agreed upon by appropriate members of the Project Team that will be executed in the current weeks Project Plan with the express purpose of reducing a given Risks Likelihood and/or Impact. All Risks with a Likelihood of 3 or more and/or an Impact of Operational or Profound must have a defined Mitigation Plan. (NOTE: a given Project Team may choose to define Risk Mitigation Plans for Risks with lower Likelihood and/or Impact rankings). All tasks in the Mitigation Plan should be assignable to a single accountable resource associated with the Project. Each Task must be granular enough to be accomplished within one weeks time by the assigned resource, i.e. the tasks listed in a given Risks Mitigation Plan are expected to flow from the Risk Matrix onto the teams Project Plan. (NOTE: For Mitigation Plans whose complete Task Set requires more than one week to complete, the Project Team may find it helpful to indicate in this Risk Matrix column from we ek-to-week which of the specific tasks in the Mitigation Strategy have been completed to better help in the visual tracking of the progress of the Mitigation Strategy.) 2.3 Marketing plan Four steps of market plan are following: Conduct a communications marketing analysis Establish objective Create a budget Prepare a promotional strategy Conduct a communication market analysis Competitive analysis Opportunity analysis Target market analysis Customer analysis Positioning analysis Competitive analysis Fries of identify our major competitor and communication strategies and tactics of each competitor. Scour the landscape for competing and similar events that are happening around the same time. We Find out what similar events is charging for admission; consider how your product differs from theirs and what will give you the edge. We can turn similar competing events into an advantage through joint promotions. But be careful, as joint promotions can sometimes confuse the marketplace.  · Number and size of major competitors and Particular strengths and weaknesses of competitors  · Cost or funding advantages that competitors have  · Pressure from substitute products (home entertainment products and services). Opportunity analysis We see competitor what are their opportunities. Where your product will exist your competitor is heavily saturated. Whats opportunity that is not being followed? Are your competition is ignored by customer. Target market analysis Here are some examples of the kinds of markets you might be targeting. If we dont have this information from our own ongoing research, we can put together a profile from reading the research of others. For example, we can obtain magazine readership profiles from the advertising department and many arts funding agencies have market research. This is a step-by-step guide to creating a campaign strategy Market size: To make a successive product you must need to collect information about market and his size and segment. Mostly people have didnt knowledge about computer due lack of interest and knowledge. Our product barrier is very small network of telecommunication and high prices in computer prices. Customer analysis Identify the current customer of the company and your competitor. Analyze who is potentially customer who do not purchase the product but may become interested. Then analyze your product customer like whats his age, sex employee, unemployed, and his psychograph profile which is given below:  · Age: 40% aged 40 to 54 and 45% 18 to 39  · Sex: 25% female  · Employment:70% working  · Psychographic profile: 45% experiential cluster, Experience new groups and enjoy new and different things. Attracted to visually interesting performances and like to be made to think. Positioning analysis All promotions are related to our or our companys overall market positioning for us or our company. Positioning differentiates your company or offers our competition and should appeal to our target market. Market positioning Look at other companies, how they promote themselves, their audiences, their location, their programming. We differentiate organization or event in relation to the competition. Here are some examples:  · The market leader, the market challenger.  · As attracting younger or older audiences, family audiences, cutting edge or more mainstream audiences  · Your spectacular location, entrance policies Establish communication objective Our product advertising mission is to making an effective advertisement according to our budget and cost effective advertising. Our objective is as follow: Develop brand awareness Change consumer beliefs or attitude Increase good/service category or attitude Enhance purchase actions Encourage repeat purchase Build consumer traffic Enhance firm image Increase market share Increase sales. Create a communication budget Percentage of sale Meet the competition What we can afford Objective and the task Quantitive model Prepare communication strategy Communication is not just about persuasion its about education and image-building, about listening to and engaging with people of all ages from all kinds of backgrounds. The theory of communication Introduction Know yourself Know your audience Know your competitors Market positioning WRITING YOUR COMMUNICATIONS STRATEGY Introduction Communication objective Target Audience   Key Messages Key Selling Points Personality and Tone COMMUNICATIONS PRACTICE Introduction Communications Channels Words The Image

Dynamic Characters and Survival in John Steinbecks The Grapes of Wrath

Dynamic Characters and Survival in John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath In the American epic novel, The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck, there are pivotal and dynamic changes that occur in the various significant characters of Jim Casy, Ma Joad, and Tom Joad. Steinbeck specifically uses these characters to show their common realizations about all of humanity, in order to demonstrate his underlying meaning about the importance of people coming together, helping each other out, and surviving. Ma Joad illustrates this idea clearly when she speaks to Tom mid-way through the novel: â€Å"Why, Tom, we’re the people that live. They ain’t gonna wipe us out. Why we’re the people--we go on.† (350) Early in the novel we are introduced to a journeying preacher named Jim Casy, who has already been drifting for four years. He has gone through a dynamic change, and through the course of the novel he learns how to apply his new Emerson worldview of an Oversoul that all of humanity is a part of. Jim Casy sees the good in all things and people: â€Å"There ain’t no sin and there ain’t no virtue. There’s just stuff people do.† (30) He therefore shares a concern for and a need to be with the people. It isn’t until later in the novel, however, that Jim Casy becomes fully aware of the truth behind his ideas. When he sacrifices to go to jail for Tom, he learns in prison about the strength and power of men working together to reach their goals. Jim Casy is murdered after he gets out of jail, trying to put some of these new ideas into action. His message only comes into true realization after his death, as it branches out and attracts followers suc h as Tom Joad, but it can be seen in many of the actions of Ma Joad throughout the book. To... ... She comforts the Wilsons, feeds the starving nameless faces when she barely has enough for her own family, works together with the Wainwrights, and as the novel closes she is still directing her assistance to those who are in need any way she can, by helping the starving man and taking control of the situation. She feels that as long as she can hold on to some part of the family, she will see to it that they keep on going. Thus with the Joads and company, the journey West is also a journey from personal concern for oneself, to a larger concern for all of humanity. When there doesn’t seem to be anything left, at least you have each other, the people. That is what will endure, continue, live on, and populate the world. Ma reassures the family at the end of the novel that they are not going to die out, they may change a little, but they will go right on.